HOLY SH!T: Nicolas Winding-Refn Announces ‘Valhalla Rising’ Sequel

June 21st, 2013

Justin Proper

When I finally rolled out of bed around noon today I was unaware that something amazing had happened. For years I had raved to all my friends that love movies about how good Valhalla Rising was, constantly talking about how it was the perfect film.

Now it seems that Refn and Mads Mikkelsen will be teaming up again to revisit the character One-Eye from Valhalla Rising, only this time in Tokyo.

Indiewire sat down and talked to Refn at the North American premiere of his new film Only God Forgives (full review here) and the director revealed that he wanted to revisit One-Eye due to the similarities between that character and the leads in Drive and Only God Forgives. He also spoke of his desire to make a movie in Tokyo, hinting that the Valhalla Rising sequel would be that film. How will he take an 11th century viking warrior and put him into Tokyo? Refn cryptically said that the film would be “About the future…”

For those unfamiliar with the masterpiece Valhalla Rising, it is about a viking warrior (One-Eye) that travels with a group of Christian Crusaders looking for a new land to spread their religion. Throughout the film One-Eye has cryptic visions of his future so it is easy to see how the character could make the jump from 1000 C.E. to modern times, or perhaps the new One-Eye is just a long lost descendant of the character from the film. No matter how he gets to Japan I am certain that Refn will not disappoint.

Nicolas Winding-Refn’s new film, Only God Forgives releases in North America July 19, and he is currently working on a new Barbarella television series which should air sometime in the near future. In the meantime go ahead and watch one of my favorite scenes from Valhalla Rising below, which is a bit NSFW due to gore.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W8qasNIcOUM